Left-Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China

Sylvie Démurger and Hui Xu ()
Additional contact information
Hui Xu: Beijing Normal University

No 7727, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper examines how left-behind children influence return migration in China. We first present a simple illustrative model based on Dustmann (2003) that incorporates economic and non-economic motives for migration duration (or intentions to return), among which are parents' concerns about the well-being of their left-behind children. We then propose two complementary empirical tests based on data we collected from rural households in Wuwei county (Anhui province) in fall 2008. We first use a discrete-time proportional hazard model to estimate the determinants of migration duration for both on-going migrants with an incomplete length of duration and return migrants with a complete length of duration. Second, we apply a binary Probit model to study the return intentions of on-going migrants. Both models yield consistent results regarding the role of left-behind children as a significant motive for return. First, left-behind children are found to draw their parents back to the village, the effect being stronger for pre-school children. Second, sons are found to play a more important role than daughters in reducing migration duration.

Keywords: discrete-time duration analysis; return migration; migration duration; left-behind children; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C25 C41 J13 J61 O53 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 52 pages
Date: 2013-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-cna, nep-mig and nep-tra
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Published - published in: IZA Journal of Migration, 2015, 4:10

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp7727.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Left-Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China (2011)
Working Paper: Left‐Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China (2011)
Working Paper: Left-Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China (2011)
Working Paper: Left-Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China (2011)
Working Paper: Left-Behind Children and Return Decisions of Rural Migrants in China (2011)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7727

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().